Читать книгу Taking le Tiss онлайн

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STUART WAS THESCARIEST MAN IHAVE EVERPLAYED AGAINST,BY A MILE. ALL ICAN SAY IS IT IS AGOOD JOBSAINTS PLAYEDIN DARK-COLOUREDSHORTS.

Stuart was the scariest man I have ever played against, by a mile. All I can say is it is a good job Saints played in dark-coloured shorts. I was terrified. His thighs were wider than my torso. I think I got three kicks in that first half, and all from him. The first time he clattered me it was like ‘Welcome to the First Division son.’ To be honest I didn’t even try and take him on. The look in his eyes was enough. It was a steep learning curve for me but I can’t have done too badly because I got seven out of 10 in the paper even though we lost 3-1. Colin Clarke brought us level at 1-1 with 16 minutes to go, but they won with two goals from Gary Birtles and one from Neil Webb. It’s just as well there was only one sub back then because otherwise I might well have been off.

I found myself back on the bench after that and I was probably lucky not to be dropped altogether. In fact Chris Nicholl made a special point of kicking lumps out of me in training. I think he was trying to toughen me up and to get me used to facing players like Stuart Pearce. Chris had a real mean look in his eyes and you could tell he meant every kick, but I really believe he thought he was doing the best for me. After that I spent quite a lot of time on the bench, which was very frustrating. I think he was trying to protect me and bring me through slowly, just like Sir Alex Ferguson did with Ryan Giggs.